


Of Christmas and Trees

by Jacqueline_64



Category: Starsky & Hutch
Genre: Christmas, Culture, Gen, Not Beta Read, Religion, beliefs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:53:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28010454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jacqueline_64/pseuds/Jacqueline_64
Summary: A conversation between the two partners about their relation with Christmas
Kudos: 6





	Of Christmas and Trees

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. Quite a number of fans had Starsky characterized as Jewish. Probably based on the fact that the actor who “gave him life” was Jewish (what we in my family call) by “blood”. Some fans also based their belief on the fact that in the interior of Starsky’s apartment there was a menorah and in the episode “Little girl lost” there was a “star of David” on the dashboard of the Torino.  
> I never put much weight on those “facts”, simply because I have plenty of friends who are not practicing the Jewish or any other faith, yet have a menorah at home for decorative reasons. I also have a very hard time recognizing the “star of David” in the blue, solid, star on the Torino’s dashboard. Christmas includes stars, too, so it was a Christmas episode, there was a star on the dashboard, period. No links to Starsky’s supposed Jewish roots as far as I’m concerned.  
> 2\. In the featurette “Behind the badge” in the Starsky & Hutch DVD box set, season 1, Joe Naar only goes as far as saying that he guessed Paul Michael Glaser “looked like a man who might be called Starsky”. Leonard Goldberg describes Paul Michael Glaser as “the more energetic, intense, Jewish, Paul Michael Glaser”. So NOT the character Starsky, but the actor who portrayed that character – Glaser - perhaps colored by the fact that both Spelling and Goldberg were Jewish. In fact: Starsky’s background is never specified in the series. Most fans, like myself, assumed he was Jewish, probably because the actor who played him was. I personally never assumed the Starsky character was anything other than Jewish “by blood”. Partially because in my family tree, we have a lot of “bloods” (which can be translated as “ethnicities”) including Jewish “blood”, but the majority of my relatives aren’t Jewish by religion, which is the inspiration for my take on Starsky in my stories and series, in combination with factual background information from the actor who played Starsky:  
> 3\. Paul Michael Glaser was interested in Judaism from a historical and social angle, rather than a religious one. As he told the Jewish Television Network in 1998:  
> "My father's father was a very religious man. He was one of the founders of a very big conservative temple in Boston Kehilath Isreal in Brookline, Massachusetts and my mother wasn't, at all raised in a very strong Jewish tradition. In fact, she was basically agnostic. I was Bar Mitzvahed, uhm..reform and ah, then I, uh, then I kinda went... I've been in a very spiritual journey of my life. I don't know that in Judaism, I have found an awful lot of the idiom or the teaching's applicable in my daily life. And I, I know it's there....I don't think I ever uh, uh, achieved that or was able to experience that. So I find myself, I'm kind of a fringe what they call a "JewBu" A Jewish Buddhist." So, in my Starsky & Hutch fanfic universe, Starsky is Jewish by blood, but definitely NOT by religion.  
> 4\. The history that the characters refer to is in line with my "Getting to know Me and Thee" series. Same literary license.

The most used disclaimer:   
The TV show "Starsky and Hutch", and the characters from it   
are the property of the persons who hold the copyrights   
and other legal rights to them.   
This story is a work of fiction, written for pleasure only   
and not for profit. It is not intended, in any way,   
to infringe on these preexisting copyrights.

# Of Christmas and Trees

Jacqueline©2020-12-11

“Why are you so into Christmas anyway?” Hutch asked his partner.

“Whaddayamean?”

“You let yourself be fooled into all the hubbub every year and every year it gets to you earlier. Christmas in July next time, sheesh.”

“We’re not all curmudgeons like you, Hutch. It’s the joy and peacefulness of the season…. Ya know?”

“Oh, brother. Starsky, it’s all one big commercial flytrap that has nothing to do with peace and joy, but everything with the reality of making lots of cold, hard, cash off of people like you. At least Hanukkah hasn’t been commercialized yet …. Why don’t you celebrate that?”

“Why would I wanna celebrate Hanukkah?” a bewildered Starsky asked.

“What?”

“You asked why I don’t celebrate Hanukkah. Why would I want to celebrate that?”

“Well ….. I mean ….. Isn’t that ….. Didn’t you …… Aren’t you…..” Hutch fumbled for words as he developed a blush. His mind was going over all the years he’d known Starsky now, ever since the Academy, and he only now came to the realization that Starsky had never ever mentioned any celebrations other than birthdays and Christmas.

“What?” Starsky was still waiting and seemed genuinely confused.

After a moment of silence, a slightly embarrassed Hutch timidly continued  
“Well…….. I uh, I know why I as somebody who …. who was raised in the Christian faith, doesn’t celebrate Christmas. But I ….. you never told me why you ….. as somebody … as …. as a Jewish person, never celebrate Hanukkah ….. You know? I just wondered about that….”

Another, longer, moment of silence during which Hutch' unease with the situation only grew as did Starsky’s confusion. Finally Starsky answered  
“How long have we known each other now? A little over 10 years ….. and **now** you wonder why? And just about Hanukkah? There are other Jewish religious holidays and I don’t celebrate them either, or hadn’t you noticed?”

The partners looked at each other, much like when they first got to know each other. In a strange way, this moment was a renewed introduction of sorts.

“I guess we never talked about this …. In-depth ….. Yeah, I’m Jewish …. My family is Jewish, kinda…. You’ve met them; mom, aunt Rosie, uncle Al, their sons Alan and Gary….. my brother Nicky….. Don’t ask me how it works ….. you should ask my mom, she’s better at this stuff than I am. Ya see, we’re Jewish by blood. Like we’re also Italian, Scottish, Irish, Polish and German. All our Jewish blood is from the male line, the paternal line and so we’re not really _Jewish_ Jewish …. I dunno how that works, like I said, you should ask my mom. We always celebrated Christmas, even went to mass when I was a little kid, because my mom’s parents were Catholic and they’d take us kids to Church on Christmas eve.”

“But wasn’t your granddad a rabbi?” Hutch asked, thoroughly confused now that he heard something from his partner he’d never asked or wondered about during all the years they’d known each other.

“Yep, well, sorta. Grandpa Micha, my dad’s dad, he wasn’t really Jewish either, in that, his mom was German and Polish, I think, and his dad was only half Jewish and from the paternal line to boot. Many years after my dad died, my mom once told me that grandpa Micha was bent on becoming a rabbi and once he got to the US, he studied himself silly. My grandma Eileen was a Scottish Reformed and they weren’t really religious …. But once they arrived in the US, my grandpa went overboard. You know, there’s a saying about how two religions on one pillow spell nothing but trouble? Well, my dad told my mom that my grandpa Micha decided on the names of the kids, but my grandma took ‘em to Church. So, they had four kids with very Jewish names, and they were going to church like that. Oh, man.”

Starsky chuckled, while Hutch anticipated the rest of this family tale, that he’d never heard before from his partner.

Starsky seemed to recall more as he thought about it, and so he continued

“You know my dad was the only one who was born in New York? He was the youngest. Anyway, his older brother never had a Bar Mitzvah and neither had grandpa Micha. But he got so crazy religious, my grandpa, that he wanted to do a joint Bar Mitzvah, you know, with my dad when he turned 12 and his older brother, uncle Mendel, who was about 16 or something at that time. Well, my dad told my mom that he didn’t feel like it, and uncle Mendel totally didn’t feel like it and grandma Eileen threatened to divorce grandpa Micha if he’d force her sons to do it. Of course grandpa was between a rock and a hard place. Here he was tryin’ out on becoming a rabbi, but he was stuck with a Christian wife and two sons with Jewish names who refused to have a Bar Mitzvah!”

“But I thought he **was** a rabbi? Or was that your other grandfather?” Hutch asked, now getting confused himself.

“Grandpa David? Yeah, he had a Jewish mom, but also from a paternal line. And he was a Scottish Catholic, so no. Nope, Grandpa Micha became sort of a deputy rabbi, but he always referred to himself as rabbi.”

“Deputy rabbi?” Hutch’s brain was slowly beginning to melt from all the Starsky family history, especially the way his partner related it to him in his very own, special, way. He was beginning to feel sorry he’d asked.

“Yeah, I mean, from what mom told me, the Jewish immigrants where they lived in New York were kinda strict, religion wise. So, the more mixed you were with other stuff, you know, other ethnicities and especially other religions, the more they got to you. Like try to convert you, which neither of my grandmothers wanted, because like I said, grandma Eileen was Reformed and grandma Rosa was Catholic. Or they made sure you didn’t live in the center of the neighborhood, but more on the outskirts, so the center was more for the conservative folks, you know, nearer to Temple or Shul. So, grandpa Micha never passed the apprentice level to become a rabbi. He just had too many things going against him.”

Suddenly Starsky burst out laughing  
“I just realized what he meant each time he’d say this. He often said “This whole mishpachah has Jewish blood, but none of them are Jews!” Oh, that’s funny!”

Hutch chuckled along, but Starsky suddenly got serious.

“Ya know? Grandpa Micha became sort of ……. extreme in his beliefs as he got older. So much so, that my dad sorta gave in to him and said that he would let me go do the whole Bar Mitzvah thing and that he’d do it together with me….. you know, sorta to appease his dad, but also to get him off his back. I mean, I really loved grandpa Micha, but he couldn’t talk about anything but religion anymore the older he got. It got to a point that my dad and me kinda felt uncomfortable having to spend time with him, you know?”

Starsky sighed and looked at Hutch with a melancholic expression on his face  
“Well, you know what happened. Dad was killed 2 months before I turned 12, so before we’d be having our Bar Mitzvah. And then grandpa Micha said something that just pissed me off on top of that ….. Said that dad would have had the protection had he only embraced religion …. If only he’d stuck to tradition and had his Bar Mitzvah at age 12, then none of this would have happened.”

Starsky shivered involuntarily before continuing  
“Said the man who was only about a quarter Jewish and never had a Bar Mitzvah himself! He kinda pushed my mom into letting me go ahead with it anyway, but thankfully, she didn’t force me to. He did blame her for me spinning out of control, though, after my dad died.”

Starsky sighed and shook his head  
“He really painted himself into a corner. Lived for his books on religion, couldn’t talk about anything else anymore. Grandma Eileen stuck with him, but the last years with him must’ve been hard on her. They uh …… they lived in the same house, but that was about it. Grandma made him three meals a day, and he ate all of them in his study with his precious books. That’s where she found him one morning. He’d probably passed away in the night, while reading one of his books.”

Starsky gave Hutch a bashful smile.  
“I’d been living with aunt Rosie and uncle Al for some time then, so I wasn’t at the funeral. But the first time I saw grandma Eileen again after grandpa Micha had passed, she was a completely different woman. Much more relaxed and fun. She and grandpa Micha had four kids, 2 girls, 2 boys, and my dad was the youngest. And they all had different thoughts on religion. Like I said, she’d take them to church, but she never forced anything on them, unlike grandpa Micha. I know my aunt Golde experimented with Judaism a while but I don’t think she kept up with it. Aunt Ayla is Reformed like grandma Eileen was. Uncle Mendel is….. hmmm, I don’t think he was anything. And dad was ….. dad was just open to everything. He loved his Catholic mother in law, my grandma Rosa. He had a great, black, friend in the police force …. I forgot his name, and I know he went to his Methodist church a few times. He was friends with a Bhuddist Asian man, who taught him some martial arts, and who taught my mom to make the best wontons. My dad was the best, he just was open to everything and everyone. That’s why my mom loved him and that’s why they fit together so well. They were more spiritual than religious. It sure took me several years to appreciate that, but once I got stuff out of my system, I knew that’s what I wanted for myself, too.”

“So, I just pick what speaks to me, ya know? In everything. I like Christmas, so that’s what I celebrate. I like pork chops, mu shi pork and so I eat that without feeling guilty or sinful. I socialize with everybody …. Not just with people like me…….”

Starsky paused for a moment  
“No, correction…. I DO socialize with people like me when I socialize with everybody… Because next to Jewish blood, I got tons of other bloods inside me, too ….. I’m everybody and everybody is me ….. Not being pigeonholed makes life easier and better, don’tcha think?”

Although Hutch had listened more than he had spoken, the waterfall of Starsky family history had made him thirsty, so he merely nodded his head in agreement to his partner as he took a sip from his beer. Still, he couldn’t help himself from asking yet another question about Starsky’s family, and bit his lip in near regret after the words had left his mouth  
“I didn’t hear some names you mentioned before of your uncles …. What was it again? Alphonse and uhm …”

“Myron?”

“Yeah, yeah, I think so …. Or are they your mom’s brothers?”

“Nope, my dad’s older half brothers. Ya see, grandpa Micha really did not stand a snowball’s chance in hell of ever becoming a real rabbi, because he’d already been divorced back in Poland. His first wife was a Polish lady, not one drop of Jewish blood in her, and they had Alphonse and Myron. My dad never knew the full story of why they’d divorced, but it probably had to do with grandpa Micha’s dream of becoming a rabbi, too. My mom did tell me he felt cursed because his first wife died shortly after they were divorced, so had he waited longer, he wouldn’t have been a divorced man and that would have made it easier for him to try …”

“And become a rabbi….” Hutch finished Starsky’s sentence  
“So why did he marry another totally non Jewish lady, a Scottish Christian at that, if he really was that obsessed with becoming a rabbi?”

Starsky shrugged his shoulders  
“I dunno. He was a very odd guy. I don’t like having to say that about my granddad, but …. He just was. If anything, he scared the crap out of Nicky and me with his tales of doom and suffering of our people, especially when he’d started wearing all black clothes from a certain point on. My dad wasn’t happy about that at all, but he didn’t want to disrespect his dad either. But ….. it pretty much resulted in the opposite of what granddad wanted for himself and our family. He never got to be a real rabbi, none of us – not my dad, or Nicky or me Bar Mitzvahed. Nicky is an Atheist, I’m a little bit of everything and dad …. Well, had he lived, he’d only done a Bar Mitzvah to appease his dad.”

The stillness of the evening surrounded the two friends as they were both lost in their thoughts for a while. Then Hutch broke the quiet on his terrace,  
“Isn’t it strange how we’ve known each other for so many years, even shared a room for months at the Academy, and there are still things we don’t know about each other?”

Starsky studied his friend for a moment before responding  
“Still, I think you know way more about me and my family than I do about yours. I’ve always thought you’d make a great spy. You never volunteer to tell anything; people have to pry you open, like a clam.”

“Oh, come on now. I’m not **that** bad!” Hutch replied defensively.

“Nah, really. Remember that one time at the Academy, when you’d opened my mail by accident? You asked me who the people were in the photo I showed you of my family and I pretty much told you everything, but when I asked about your family when you showed me their photo, you kept the info as minimal as possible….. Remember?”

Hutch instantly remembered the incident that Starsky was referring to, and even though it happened many years ago, the memory of it still caused him to blush slightly. He slowly nodded his head before asking  
“What do you want to know?”

Starsky looked startled  
“Really?”

“Yeah, really. Go ahead….. ask me anything you want to know about me, my family….. anything,” Hutch encouraged.

“Whoa….. okay, then. Uh….. Okay, let’s start with something light, like religion,” Starsky winked at Hutch, as he sat up straighter  
“What religion does the Hutchinson family practice?”

Hutch raised his eyebrows and made a face while he, too, changed position, before starting his answer.  
“Well, as you know, my paternal family originates from Norway and they were members of the Evangelical Lutheran Church. But there was religious freedom from very early on in Norway, so pretty much all religions lived peacefully next to each other. Most Norwegians are also quite liberal, or at least my family was ….. my great grandfather and my grandfather were. They were very inquisitive and st…… well, I wouldn’t say really studied, but, but …. were ….. interested in other religions, too. To some degree they were kind of like you just described yourself and your dad; they picked up stuff from other religions and cultures that they agreed with. My grandfather moved here as a young man, met my grandmother here – who was Swedish by the way – and Sweden had its own brand of Evangelical Lutheran religion because, you know, Sweden and Norway were once one country, until Norway became an independent nation and much later seceded from Sweden. But uh, where was I? Oh, yeah, so they, my paternal grandparents had sort of the same religion, and uhm…”

“Can I ask you something?” Starsky interrupted.

“Huh? Yeah, sure.”

“How come your last name sounds English? They don’t speak English down in Norway, do they? I mean, as a first language?”

“No, first language is Norwegian, although many of them speak English very well. Uhm, the reason for our English sounding last name is simple: somewhere in our family tree a Brit moved to Scandinavia and married a Scandinavian lady. I think about 5 or 6…. No, 5 generations ago. And all the following generations included more than one son, so, that’s how the name survived.”

“Okay. So?”

“So? So, what?”

“Your granddad married the Swedish lady here in the US!”

“Right. So, they got married here. They soon moved to Minnesota and settled there; started a family. That’s where my father was born. And they …..”

“Can I ask something else?”

“Sure.”

“What were your grandparents names?”

“Their names? Well, my granddad – as I’m sure you’ll remember when you found out my name in the Academy – was the original Kenneth William Hutchinson. Number one. My father, being the oldest son, was named after him, so he’s number two. And I am his **only** son, so I am Kenneth William Hutchinson the third, originally. And my grandmother’s name was Bothilder Fagerstrom.”

At the sound of his partner grandmother’s name, Starsky made a face that caused Hutch to chuckle.

“Yeah, I know. But she was the sweetest, warmest, lady. And I’d already told you what a great man my grandfather was.”

“Yeah, I remember. I never really did find out why your dad was so different from his parents …. Or am I going too far, now?” Starsky asked.

“No….. no, that’s quite alright. I, uh, I’m not really sure, to tell you the truth. Maybe it was because he was just a different type of …. of man than my grandfather was. My grandfather was a huge man with a very physical nature. Good at sports. He loved to go out fishing and building stuff with his hands. The original Viking type. If you see old pictures of Vikings, you know big, blond, bearded guys? That sort of was the way my granddad looked. I’ll look up some photos to show you later. He had an artist’s soul, as did my grandmother. Both of them loved to create things with their hands. My grandmother did needlepoint and knitted…. a lot! She made mosaics. And my grandfather built his own tool shed and did woodwork and things like that. They had 3 sons and 2 daughters and my father, well, I guess he was the odd one out. Not as physical as the rest of them. I mean, at 6 feet, he was the same height as his older sister, to give you an idea. He was tiny compared to my uncles. And although the others went to college, too, I guess my father over compensated his lack of physicality by excelling intellectually. And by doing that, he ended up in a whole different part of society than the rest of the family; the corporate side and he ….. I guess he completely assimilated to that type of lifestyle……….”

Hutch was lost in his thoughts for a moment, before he continued in a slightly forced light tone of voice  
“And the rest is history, as you know.”

“Go on.”

“What?”

“Religion!”

“Oh! Uhm, yeah, so, uhm…. Well, my grandparents raised their children Evangelical Lutheran and so that was my father’s religion. He did faithfully go to church every Sunday, but I’m not quite sure how he could conciliate his religious beliefs and teachings with the hard reality of the corporate world he worked in. Maybe that is one of the reasons why he was the way he was. I think …… Maybe he was such a different father from his father to my sister and me because he had to stay tough and on his toes, professionally. Maybe he was afraid that if he ever let his guard down and tap into his feelings more, he might lose his edge professionally. I don’t know. This is all speculation.”

Another silence descended upon the friends. Then Starsky asked  
“What turned you off of Christmas?”

Hutch looked somewhat shocked at his partner before answering  
“Oh, come on, Starsk! I told you why at the beginning of this conversation! It’s the commercialism and the..”

“Na-ah, it ain’t that,” Starsky interrupted  
“It’s something else ….. it happened earlier ….. and it goes much deeper. If ya don’t wanna delve that deep, that’s okay… but if you do……”

Hutch looked caught. He took a sip from his beer and stared into the half-empty glass for a long moment before answering Starsky.  
“I think the root of it lies in ….. in what I saw, back when I was a kid. You know my father did very well, financially. We lived in a big house, had a maid, went to private schools. My mother was a member of many committees – one of the ladies who lunch and sign charity cheques – and when I was old enough to start thinking for myself, I started to get conflicted. I mean, here we were, the whole family sitting at one of the front rows of the Church at Christmas, singing the hymns and all those things. My mother signing cheques, my father donating large bills into the collection box, but on the other hand, my parents very easily ignored poverty when they came face to face with it. Like when they’d pass the odd beggar or if there was a detour in traffic that took us through poorer neighborhoods. Things like that. They did not want to be confronted with anybody less fortunate than they were. My father for the longest time always claimed that people were poor for a reason; that nobody needed to be poor if they’d just put some effort into it. To me that always sounded so contrary to what Christianity should be about. And before Christmas turned commercial, at my home I already saw things around that time of the year that were totally opposite of what that sentiment should be like, should represent. The annual Christmas party at the Hutchinson mansion consisted of getting together the sort of high society of the business world, sharing Martinis and Scotch, talking about victories in court cases, profits for businesses and exchanging business cards……”

Hutch took a big swig of his beer before looking at Starsky and ending his monologue  
“So, yeah, there you have it. I guess all that turned me off of religion, including milestones like Christmas, because the real sentiments are no longer there.”

Starsky looked at his partner for a long moment.  
“Would you say you are as open-minded as your grandparents were?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, you said your grandparents were curious about other religions and that they picked up stuff from other religions and cultures that they agreed with, like my dad and me. Are you …. Do you consider yourself to be like them in that way?”

“Where are you going with this?”

“Well, I figured that you could change your idea about Christmas by making it about … about what it’s supposed to be about, again. You know? Not just complain about what it has become but make it what you say it’s supposed to be about! Huh? Whaddaya say?”

Hutch had to chuckle  
“Is this really the advice from the guy who complained about not getting a caboose for his train set but instead got a tree planted in his name for Christmas?”

“Hey, I’m willing to scoot over a bit to the middle if you are!”

Hutch smiled at his partner and raised his glass  
“Okay, then.”

“Merry Christmas, Hutch.”

“Starsky, it’s still two weeks until …..” Hutch sputtered.

“Shut up, don’t spoil the toast.”


End file.
